1. Field
A refrigerator having a structure capable of adjusting a flow rate of cold air supplied into a refrigerator main body by a user's manual operation.
2. Background
In general, a refrigerator keeps foods such as meat, fish, vegetables, fruits, beverages and the like in a fresh state. A conventional refrigerator includes a refrigerator main body having storage spaces such as a freezing chamber, a refrigerating chamber, vegetable chambers, and the like, a refrigerating cycle device provided in the refrigerator main body, and a door mounted to one side of the refrigerator main body to open and close the storage spaces.
The refrigerating cycle device of the refrigerator is activated when temperature of the freezing chamber or the refrigerating chamber is more than a preset temperature. In response to the activation of the refrigerating cycle device, cold air is generated in an evaporator and then circulates along the storage spaces. While the cold air circulates along the storage spaces, the storage spaces are maintained at preset temperatures.
Refrigerators are classified into various types according to a method of circulating cold air, locations of a freezing chamber, and a refrigerating chamber, and a configuration of an evaporator.
As one example, refrigerators may include a refrigerator having a freezing chamber located above a refrigerating chamber, a refrigerator having a freezing chamber and a refrigerating chamber located side by side, a refrigerator having a freezing chamber located below a refrigerating chamber, and the like.
A chiller chamber may be formed at the lowermost portion of the refrigerating chamber. The chiller chamber may include a chiller chamber drawer, and a chiller chamber cover forming an upper surface of the chiller chamber drawer. The chiller chamber may be used to store meat and the like. The chiller chamber is preferably maintained at a relatively low temperature close to 0° C. To this end, a duct with a cold air passage is installed at a rear side of the chiller chamber so as to supply cold air into the chiller chamber. The amount of cold air should be adjusted according to an amount of meat kept in the chiller chamber or an external temperature.
A conventional refrigerator includes a damper or an insulating material installed in the duct, along which the cold air flows, to adjust the amount of cold air supplied into the refrigerating chamber. However, the damper or the insulating material are not manually controlled by a user, but automatically controlled in an electric manner. Moreover, the amount of cold air was controlled by electrically adjusting an opening and closing amount of the damper, which made it impossible to adjust the amount of cold air supplied into the refrigerating chamber according to a user's need. Additionally, cold air supplied to the refrigerating chamber along the duct was not uniformly supplied through a cold air discharge opening.
Furthermore, the electric control of the amount of cold air resulted in increased power consumption, as well as increased material costs due to the installation of the damper and electric components for controlling the damper.